An Eventful Breakfast, Part 1

The Dance Hall was still a half-hour from busy, the morning’s spill of gold light arcing through the clerestory windows and pooling on the polished blackwood floor. The tables were set for the seated breakfast of the bachelorette party, but few guests had arrived yet. Some of the harem already sat at a few tables, deep in conversation.

Two high-backed armchairs, as blue as robin’s eggs, stood sentinel at the far edge of the room, a little cove set off from the main tide of round tables. Chloe had claimed one. She’d put herself together for the occasion—a pale yellow sundress with eyelet trim at the collar, hair done up in a soft chignon—but the effect had been quietly overtaken: low heeled shoes to the side, bare feet tucked beneath her, a muslin cloth thrown over one shoulder, and the whole careful picture reorganized around the small, comforting weight of the baby in her arms.

She had learned, over the last day or so, that nothing slowed a newborn’s feeding but the baby’s own agenda. JJ had been latched on for ten minutes and showed no sign of being finished. Chloe cupped the back of his head with her palm and hummed softly, off-key, letting her voice roll through her chest and out through the top of his fuzzy little head. His face was slack with the work of it, eyes closed, every line of his tiny body drawn inwards to the one job he knew how to do. Chloe watched his cheek hollow and fill, the sharp pull-pause of a baby who’d figured out this new world had exactly one redeeming feature so far.

She barely noticed the sound of footfalls, not at first. The Dance Hall had the kind of hush that erased background noise. It was only when the footsteps got closer—unhurried, but somehow carrying a faint fizz of anticipation—that Chloe looked up.

Candy was the first out-of-season guest to make it into the Hall. She’d come in from the main terrace, navigating the maze of chairs and tables without any of the self-consciousness Chloe always felt in new rooms. She spotted Chloe immediately, and the effect was electric: her butterfly wings snapped half-open in a startle, then folded tight again as she veered off her original course and made straight for the armchairs. She had a gift for drawing every eye in a room—today in a clingy powder-pink sundress, hair coiled into some kind of floral updo that still, improbably, worked with her wings. The effect was less “exotic animal in a glass case” than “girl who accidentally drank the love potion and was now doing everything at 2x speed.”

Candy crouched by the arm of Chloe’s chair, her hands flying to her mouth at the sight of them. “Oh my God,” she said, voice catching on the edge of a giggle. “Oh. My. God. That’s—” She looked from JJ to Chloe and back, her blue eyes nearly iridescent with delight.

Chloe felt herself go a little pink. “He’s Riley’s, actually. Two days old and already has more hair than his dad ever did, she says.” She adjusted the muslin cloth, a small, self-conscious gesture. “She’s with her sisters. I’m just—” She glanced down at JJ, then back up. “It works out.”

Candy made a noise that belonged more to a puppy than a person, then wrapped her arms around Chloe in a gentle, sideways hug, careful not to squish the baby. She pressed her cheek to Chloe’s shoulder and stayed there a long second, the hug radiating actual warmth even before she said, “I missed you so much I nearly crashed into the buffet table.”

“You literally did,” Chloe said, laughing. “The look on that poor Mildred’s face when you clipped the coffee carafe—”

“Not my finest hour,” Candy said, and grinned at the memory. She settled into the second armchair, wings folded so tightly they vanished behind her, and let out a long, satisfied sigh. “He’s beautiful. And you’re amazing. I can’t believe how easy you make it look.” She reached out, offering a finger for JJ to clutch. The baby’s grip was instant and fierce.

Chloe watched the way Candy’s whole face melted at the touch, her eyes softening in a way that left her a little unguarded. “He’s stronger than he looks,” Chloe said.

Candy didn’t let go. “I’m not going to cry. I promised myself I wouldn’t do it before at least ten a.m.”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “It’s nine-thirty.”

Candy sniffed, but the smile was real. “So, you get to try the next one for yourself, right? You said in your last letter—”

Chloe made a face. “There’s still a way to go, but yes. I’m next on deck.” She let her hand rest on her own belly, which had begun—since last week—to hint at the unmistakable choreography of a baby. “Well, technically Erin and Claire first, because they take less time, but…” She shrugged, with a shy smile. “He’s coming.”

Candy watched the motion, rapt. She giggled again, then turned misty-eyed. “I read your letter so many times it went soft before I even framed it.” Her smile faltered slightly. “I wish Mary could be here too.”

Chloe’s grin softened. “Me too. She’d be making that face she makes when she’s trying not to cry.”

There was a beat, both of them looking down at the baby, then back up at each other. Candy’s hands fidgeted with the edge of her chair, as if looking for something to do. Chloe, used to the rhythm of these conversations, let the silence stretch and fill with meaning, rather than words.

“You know what I realized, last night?” Candy said. “The last time all three of us were in one room—here, I mean—was Andy’s birthday. Before you even knew.”

Chloe’s heart gave a peculiar twist. “I remember. I was trying so hard not to be jealous I nearly gave myself an ulcer.”

Candy smiled, then, gentle. She reached over and took Chloe’s hand, squeezing it.

Chloe let the quiet settle again, the only sound the faint susurrus of JJ’s breathing and the clink of plates as the first wave of other guests drifted into the room. Across the Hall, the round breakfast tables were starting to fill.

Chloe felt Candy’s hand still wrapped around her own, and for a second she let herself believe that the moment might last forever. In the world outside the glass, time would race on, and the babies would grow, and maybe one day there would be more to wish for. But right here, right now, there was nothing left unfinished, nothing left unsaid. The armchairs remained an island in the shifting current of voices, blue and still and cradling a secret that belonged to just the two of them.

JJ, sated at last, unlatched and made a noise somewhere between a sigh and a burp. Chloe tucked the blanket around his shoulders, wiped the milk from his chin, and held him up for Candy to see. He blinked, uncertainly, into the bright overhead light, and Candy’s face went soft with awe.

“He looks adorable,” Candy whispered.

Chloe shook her head. “He looks like Riley, but he’s going to have the brains of a mad scientist and the appetite of a Labrador.”

Candy grinned. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

Chloe smiled, tired but content, and watched as Candy leaned over to press a gentle kiss to JJ’s forehead. The moment lingered, unhurried, and the world went on filling up around them.

Even as the voices grew louder, even as the Hall began to pulse with the life of a hundred stories colliding, Chloe and Candy stayed in their little pocket of morning, with the small, impossible weight of the baby sleeping in Chloe’s arms.

---

On the far side of the Dance Hall, away from the burble of the armchairs and the slow drift of guests filtering in, a single round table sat bathed in pale sunlight from the glass garden doors. It could have seated six, but only Laura and Myra had claimed it, the remaining three chairs as yet untouched. Laura sat with her backs to the windows, faces in shadow, looking down into the cups she held with both sets of hands.

Across from her, Myra kept her teacup spinning slow circles on its saucer, the steam long gone cold and untested. The blind woman had turned herself out in a soft chambray wrap dress, hair down, fox ears upright and turned toward Laura like radar. She was not watching, exactly, but the quiet calibration of her posture said she was measuring everything Laura did, every exhale, every time she set her cups down without drinking.

Laura kept her eyes fixed on her own tea. The light from the garden doors caught on her knuckles and made the bones look almost translucent. She wore her hair loose today, two matching waterfall braids wrapping from the crown and falling into the rest of it, on each head, which made her look even younger than usual.

Riley took the seat between them without asking if it was taken. She dropped into the chair in a fluid, practiced motion, one hand already reaching for the tea pot and the other smoothing the fabric of her dark-wash jeans—the ones without holes, the ones she’d paired with a clean black henley and her one good flannel, left unbuttoned. She had left her son with Chloe; it was Laura she was here to check on, and she didn’t bother with pretense.

“Am I late?” Said Riley, pouring herself a full cup without asking.

Myra’s fox ears flicked in the direction of the new arrival, but she didn’t say anything.

Laura lifted her gazes, just barely, and said, “No. Not yet.”

Riley regarded her over the rim of her mug. The silence had a weight to it, heavier than anything the three of them had ever failed to say out loud.

Then, in a tone so flat it sounded like she’d been rehearsing it all night, Riley said, “My answer changed.”

Laura met her eyes. Myra’s ears stilled, catching every syllable.

Riley kept going, eyes on Laura, voice pitched low so the words didn’t travel: “About the Gate. About whether to go through. I’m saying yes now. Whatever it costs, wherever it goes.” She took a sip of tea, then set the cup down with a soft click. “I told him two days ago, I’d need one more impossible thing before I’d ever say yes. Then he did it. JJ is the best, most improbable, most important thing I’ve ever watched happen in my life.” Her gaze flicked to Myra, then back to Laura. “So I can’t keep telling him no. Not anymore.”

Laura didn’t answer, just held her own cups with both sets of hands, the knuckles whitening again.

Myra set her cup down, untouched, and pressed her right hand flat to her chest, just over her heart, like she was keeping something from floating away.

Riley watched Laura for a beat, then softened. “I wanted you to know in person.”

Laura nodded, a small, careful motion. She kept her voices so even they nearly vanished: “I heard you. Yesterday morning. By the elevator. I was close enough to catch every word.”

Riley went a little still, then exhaled a breath through her nose, a sound that was not quite a laugh and not quite a sigh. “Guess I was never as good at secrets as I thought.”

Laura shook her heads, in tandem. “It wasn’t a secret. Not really. But I didn’t want to step in and make it about me.” She swallowed, and her voices went even quieter. “Myra and I also did. We told him that if he finds the Gate and believes he can save our moms, he should go through.”

Riley reached across the table and put her hand on the left body’s left hand, squeezing. The gesture said what the words couldn’t. Laura held on, not letting go.

Myra had been watching the riot of color that was Laura all morning. She used the silence to voice what had been haunting her since yesterday. “You know,” she said, “I’ve always seen it—the silver around you. It clings to your edges, and Andy’s, too. A kind of light that doesn’t belong to either of you alone. It’s there when you laugh, when you argue, even when you’re rooms apart. I used to think it was just aura, but it never fades, never separates.”

Laura didn’t move, but the air around her seemed to contract.

Myra went on: “It’s been thinning, the last two days. Some mornings I can barely see it at all.”

Laura closed her eyes. “I’m not surprised,” she said, “There’s more to it than the bond just running tired.”

Riley’s hand squeezed tighter. “Does Andy know?”

Laura nodded, eyes still closed. “We talked around the edges of it. More than once.”

She opened her eyes and met Riley’s. “I found a letter, in my mom’s book. She wrote it just after I was born, when she won the game and the Wish. It implies that she used her Wish to bind Andy into loving me for the rest of his life, and the other way around too. She didn’t know him, didn’t name him, let the Wish pick him, but she did it. I don’t know if she did it out of love, or desperation, or or out of trauma, but the whole thing is spelled out in handwriting. She wished for him to be mine, and for me to be his. To love each other, always, with no choice in the matter.”

Laura drew a slow breath, steadying herself. “Andy doesn't believe it. Or doesn't care. Sam told me that until we know the actual wording, we can't be sure my interpretation is correct. I’ve spent every hour since trying to figure out whether anything between us is even real, or if we’ve just been living out something she built into us before we ever had a chance to choose.” She looked down at the table, her hair falling forward and hiding her face. “I’m marrying him anyway. The choice is already made, and I’m not taking it back. But I can’t convince myself the choosing was ever really mine.”

No one said anything for a long moment.

Riley didn’t let go of her hand. Instead, she looked to Myra, a silent question.

Myra reached across the table and rested two fingers against the inside of Laura’s wrist, near her pulse. She said, “Whatever the aura turns out to be made of, it’s still there. Still worth watching over.”

Laura let out a breath she must have been holding for hours. The tension in her shoulders went slack, her grip on the cup loosening.

The round table stayed theirs a little longer as the Dance Hall filled in around them. A pair of Mildreds refilled the teapots and topped off every cup in reach, but otherwise left the women alone. Myra, not waiting for service, reached across with her right hand and topped up the tea for herself, then for Riley and Laura, moving with an automatic precision that said she was more focused on listening than on pouring.

The noise in the room had started to climb, the rhythm of conversation turning from low tide to morning traffic. Riley let the lull hang a minute, sipping her tea, then said, voice pitched low for only this table: “I want to talk about the debt. What happens when the collector shows up for it.”

She waited, checking for a reaction.

Laura didn’t miss a beat. She answered as if the question had been sitting on her tongue for an hour. “Claire thinks the debt isn’t automatic. If it’s a case the Law hasn’t seen before, the goddess has to show up in person, judge it, and rule on the outcome. If it's an edge case, nothing happens until she’s actually here and watching.” Laura picked up her cup, fingers trembling just enough to be seen. “But she also said there’s no way to guarantee it. It could still go the regular way, no matter how much we think we’ve made a new precedent.”

Myra’s hand went flat on the table, her palm against the black lacquer, before she pulled it back to her lap. Her face stayed neutral.

Riley’s gaze hung on Myra. “We already talked about this,” she said, not apologizing but not hiding it either. “A few days ago. We started working through angles, just in case. Because if a blood relation can stand in for her, we’d be first in line.”

She glanced at Laura, then at Myra, then back at Laura again. “I didn’t want to sandbag you with it, but we came up with a plan.”

Laura’s eyes narrowed, one body shifting to mirror the other’s posture. “What plan?”

Riley set her cup down, hands wrapped around the sides for warmth. “The idea is to stall. If the collector comes, or if it’s that bearded bastard you saw in the vision, we don’t try to outsmart them, we just keep them busy.” She smiled, a little. “Sam’s been working with Claire for three days straight, getting ready. She has that sword, Thrustworthy, and she got Andy to give her skills with his Coauthor Gift. If we can hold the collector off long enough, Sam gets close, makes contact, and maybe—maybe—there’s no collection at all. Or it buys enough time for Andy to cross the Gate, if that’s what it comes to.”

Laura went so still the table might have thought she’d left it. Her jaws tightened, her hands curling around the cups but not lifting them. “I already told Andy, and I’m telling you: I don’t want anyone dying for me. I made him promise. I mean it for both of you, too.”

Riley didn’t blink. “We’re not talking about dying for you. We’re talking about not letting them make the choice for us. If I have to buy you ten seconds with a lie or a sword or a distraction, that’s not dying for you, it’s living for the chance you get to go through on your own terms.”

Myra, still expressionless, nodded. “I’d rather risk it myself than watch from the sidelines while you get ripped apart,” she said. She didn’t add anything, but the pressure in the words was real.

Laura looked from Riley to Myra, then back again. Her grip on the cups slackened. Nobody at the table looked away first.

A Mildred in black-and-purple uniform passed with a tray of fresh pastries, and Myra took one without ever facing the tray. The move was casual, practiced. Laura, breaking the stare, reached for her tea and sipped. The taste had gone astringent with overbrewing, but she drank anyway.

The three of them sat in a small, unmoving triangle, holding to their quiet even as the rest of the room surged with life. The noise got louder, plates clinking, chairs scraping, someone laughing too loud at the far end of the Hall. The world inched back toward ordinary, the table a little island of stillness, and the only thing left of the earlier intensity was the way each of them, unconsciously, kept one hand flat on the table at all times.

The rest of the room didn’t notice, or maybe didn’t care. But when a ripple of new arrivals swept in from the east doors and sent a cold draft across their table, all three just turned a little closer to the center, as if that were all the defense they needed.

---

Norah arrived at the Dance Hall just after nine thirty, still half-expecting that the room would be mostly empty, and instead found it already thick with laughter, voices, and the waft of burnt toast from the buffet line. She surveyed the terrain. The round tables were set for six, each with a little flower arrangement that made her want to sneeze. At most of the tables, the harem had clustered together—Emi’s pastel warmth and Myra’s fox tails and Claire’s silent, meticulous note-taking—and Norah could see, already, that she was not going to fit at any of them.

She claimed a table near the windows, made sure her back was to the morning glare, and let herself ease into the chair one vertebra at a time. The event called for “resort formal,” which for Norah meant a cap-sleeved dress with a waist so tightly cinched it nearly cut off circulation to her lower half. She could already feel the fabric gathering sweat along her sides, and she braced for how much more fun it would get when the first cup of coffee hit.

A minute after she sat down, a figure stopped at the table’s edge. Norah glanced up, and the movement cost her more than it should: one body, two faces, both sets of green eyes fixed on her like the moment in a job interview when they ask you to explain a gap in your résumé. They carried a small plate in each hand, the left one carrying a croissant and a little pain au chocolat, the right one a slice of toast and some fruit. The one with the braid spoke first: “Excuse us—is this seat taken?”

Norah didn’t answer for a solid two seconds, her brain trying to unspool the logistics of conjoined twins sharing a chair. They were in a dress, a soft blue with a collar that did its best to square off the fact of two necks. The dress fit them oddly, bunched in some places, the right shoulder continuously slipping off. Norah realized she was staring, blinked, then waved a hand. “Go ahead. Knock yourselves out.”

The twins exchanged a micro-glance—a communication channel so fine it was almost invisible—then sat in the seat to Norah’s left.

They set their plates down together, synchronized, the motion so practiced it would have felt choreographed if there was any hint of performance. For a few seconds, none of them spoke, and Norah realized, in that quiet, that she hadn’t taken a single bite of her own breakfast.

The twin to the left broke the silence: “I’m Summer, this is Autumn, and thank you for not minding if we join. The table-hopping is… a bit more complex for us.” She grinned, then let her hand do something elaborate with a napkin.

Norah said, “I’m Norah,” and let the name hang there, neither welcoming nor warning.

Autumn gave a small, polite nod. “Nice to meet you.”

Norah liked Autumn’s economy. She wondered if the twins ever got tired of other people’s curiosity, or if it was something you eventually aged out of, like acne. She considered asking, then decided it would be at least three minutes before that would be remotely acceptable.

A commotion across the room drew Norah’s gaze. Erin—mint-green skin and not a stitch of clothing on, except for her flats—was gliding through the aisles with a plate balanced on one hand and a glass of grapefruit juice in the other. Her breasts swayed with each step. Erin caught Norah’s eye, gave a nod, and detoured directly to their table.

“Tabs!” said Erin, dropping into the remaining seat at Autumn’s right and setting her food down with a little flourish. “I thought you’d be at the business table with the other rebels.”

Norah gave her a smile. “I figured I’d try the social table today. Low risk, high reward, lots of local color.”

Erin laughed. “You know, I understand why you got into the communications game. Makes sense. More room to start fights, less chance of being eaten alive by HR.”

Norah shrugged, but felt herself uncurling, just slightly. She reached for her coffee, then saw that Summer was watching her with a curious, not-unfriendly gaze. Autumn was watching her, too, but with a different kind of silence, a practiced one.

Introductions went around again, this time Erin throwing in “I’m Erin, Harem Queen, conservation specialist, and,” she pointed a thumb at herself, “so far the only one here without clothes.” She smirked. “Not that it’s a contest, and a couple more will be around soon.”

Summer smiled back, and there was a split second where Norah caught a flash of the private joke, the one you only ever shared with your sibling and never explained to outsiders. Norah felt, for the first time in years, a hint of envy.

Summer said, “We’re told the dress code is fluid, but this is probably the most dressed-up we’ve been in months.” She tugged at the right shoulder, which had slipped again, and smoothed the fabric across her hip where it had gathered into a ridge. “We don’t really get the chance, back home.”

Autumn reached across and adjusted the collar without looking, a reflex. “Small town,” she said. “Not a lot of occasions.”

Erin said, “I only make a Thing out of it if the weather demands it,” and winked. She started to load her fork, but paused. “Is it weird if I say I envy your coordination? Some days I can’t get my own two hands to work together, let alone...” She motioned vaguely at the twins, not sure how to finish.

Summer laughed, unbothered. “It’s okay. We’ve had twenty-nine years to get the hang of it.”

Norah said, “So. You’re both Contestants?” She let the word hang in the air, half-expecting a correction.

“Yes,” said Summer, and then seemed to run out of momentum. She reached for her pain au chocolat, didn’t eat it. “First week. We’re—” She looked at Autumn.

“Still working out what’s happening,” said Autumn.

Erin arched a brow. “Wait, seriously? They just dropped you in?”

“More or less,” said Summer. “We got here this morning and there were all these other women from what sounds like completely different shows, and nobody really explained that part to us beforehand.” She made a small gesture that seemed to mean the room, the other women, all of it.

“Nobody explained most of it,” said Autumn.

Norah said, “What’s yours like, then? Your season.”

Summer and Autumn exchanged one of their micro-glances. Summer answered: “It's inside a volcano. And the Catalyst—Adrien—he’s apparently been alive for a very long time. The Host told us that. She doesn’t really explain things so much as just... say something cryptic and wait.” She picked up her croissant, then put it back down.

Autumn said, quietly, “It’s a lot.”

Norah said nothing. Erin refilled everyone’s coffee.

Summer said, “The other Contestants all seem to know him already. From different times. We don’t. We’ve never met him.” She finally took a small bite of the pain au chocolat and chewed it slowly. “So that’s where we are.”

Erin said, “That sounds terrifying.”

“Yes,” said Summer, with feeling. “It does.”

Norah, who had been quietly evaluating all of this, said, “And how is it, being the only two from your own time?”

Autumn answered, “Not as hard as you’d think. Most people don’t know what to do with us, so they just default to polite, and then it’s easy to tell who actually wants to connect and who just wants to say they talked to the twins once.”

Norah felt something in her relax at that: the directness, the lack of apology. She nodded, not needing to say more.

Erin, who never liked to let silence do more than five seconds of work, said, “So, what’s your secret for dealing with being a showpiece? You seem chill about it, but I imagine you get a lot of questions.”

Summer flashed a wide, wry smile. “The trick is to answer the first question honestly, so they never get to the weird ones. If you just tell people how you work—who controls which side, what we can and can’t feel, all of that—they run out of curiosity before they run out of nerve.”

Norah took this in with a noncommittal sound, a slow sip of coffee. She still hadn’t touched her food.

Summer went on, “You’d be surprised how many people try to guess which of us is ‘in charge.’ But it’s always both, or neither. That’s how it works for us.” She made it sound like the last word on the subject, but the smile stayed in place just long enough to invite a follow-up if anyone really wanted it.

Erin didn’t. She started in on her eggs, then said, “So, what’s the plan for today? Liesa’s got a hundred-point itinerary and a whip made of carrot sticks, so we’re probably all getting wrangled at some point.” She poked at her fruit cup with the fork.

Summer said, “We heard something about spa treatments? Also a pool.”

“That’s later,” said Autumn, voice almost a murmur. She poured a little cream in her coffee and stirred, the movement unhurried and careful. “The spa is supposed to be first. And I think it’s a lagoon.”

Erin grinned, delighted. “You two make it sound like you’ve been married for twenty years already.”

Summer glanced sideways, sharing a look with Autumn that was part affection and part exasperation. “It’s that obvious, is it?”

Norah said, “Are you a package deal, or can they break you up for the dramatic bits?”

The twins answered in stereo: “Package.” Then, after a beat, Summer said, “Amabilis asked the audience if they wanted to split us during the transformation round, but thankfully they chose not to.”

Erin looked at them, then at Norah, and took a long drink of her juice. “Hey, if anyone can game the system, it’s you two.”

Norah laughed, quick and a little sharp. “All the time.” She looked Erin over with the unhurried ease of someone who had already seen everything and filed it away. “You still look disgustingly in shape, by the way. It’s annoying.” She reached over and flicked the edge of Erin’s bare shoulder with one finger. “I’m choosing to find it obnoxious.”

Erin looked down at her own body with a kind of lazy pride. “I’m half plant now. I get all my nutrients from sunlight and water.” She flexed her arm, and the light from the window picked out a faint shimmer in the mint-green skin. “Food is just for fun.”

Summer, caught off guard, nearly choked on her croissant. She wiped her mouth, then tried to hide the smile that threatened to bloom. She wanted to ask a hundred things—about the transformations, about the harem, about what it felt like to be at ease in skin that would have sent most people running for a cover-up. But she also wanted, for once, to play it cool. So she just said, “You seem really happy.”

Erin tilted her head, thinking about it. “Yeah. I guess I am.”

Summer found herself blushing and looked down at her plate. She wasn’t used to being on this side of the interaction. Usually, she was the one bracing for a weird question; now, she just wanted to know how someone became so un-self-conscious.

Autumn picked up the slack. She said to Norah, “You don’t look like you’re enjoying the food. Is the buffet not up to standard?”

Norah glanced at her plate. “I forgot what I picked. I think I was distracted by the three women in formal wear with animal parts.”

Summer followed her gaze. The rest of the room had filled in while they were talking: at the next table over, Dawn’s bunny ears twitched in time with her conversation with a pink-haired dog-girl and a very uncomfortable-looking young fox-woman with short blonde hair.

“Is this normal for you?” Summer asked, genuine curiosity in her voice.

Norah shrugged. “The weird part is how fast it stops being weird.”

Autumn nodded, as if that answered something she hadn’t voiced. “Yes,” she said, “it’s the same in our season. The first hour is all shock. Then it’s just breakfast. We barely even notice Selene’s tail anymore.”

Erin, already on her third cup of tea, poured for everyone at the table, including the twins. She didn’t ask, just did it, and set the pot down with a gentle thunk. “You’ll get used to it,” she said to Summer, not unkind. “Or you’ll spend the whole time feeling like you’re in someone else’s fever dream. Either way, it’s better than working for a living.”

Summer laughed again, this time without apology. “Can I ask a question?”

“Shoot,” said Erin.

Summer nodded at the far side of the Hall, where a pair of identical black-haired women sat together at a table, heads angled toward each other in perfect symmetry. “Who are they? The twins? They move oddly, like they’re synchronized or something.”

Erin followed her gaze. “Oh. That’s Laura. Or, well, those are both Laura. She’s one of our group. Used to be one person, now two. She controls both bodies at once, and she feels what happens to either of them.” Erin chewed a bite of toast. “She’s the reason Andy’s here, basically.”

Summer took this in, then looked at Autumn. “Is that… does that make sense to you?”

Autumn gave a tiny shrug. “More than most things do here.”

Norah added, “The real trick is that neither body can ignore the other. It’s not a twin thing, it’s a two-bodies-one-soul thing. She calls herself ‘I’ no matter which is talking.”

Summer considered that, watched the way Laura’s two bodies both reached for the sugar at the same time and laughed, the motion mirroring itself exactly. “She looks like she’s being careful.”

Erin said, “That’s because she is.” Her voice lost the edge of amusement.

Norah said, “Some mornings, I’m convinced she’s the only one actually paying attention.”

Summer looked at her plate, then at Autumn, then at Norah and Erin. “You all seem… okay with it. With everything.”

Erin said, “That’s what happens when you run out of other options.”

The conversation split again—Erin and Summer talking about sunlight and the science of plants, Autumn and Norah swapping news about the wedding and the guests—until the room reached a new, steady volume. The hum of breakfast, the clink of silverware, the background drone of a hundred conversations.

Summer found herself relaxing, no longer bracing for the next odd question. She caught herself mid-thought, wondering how anyone could adapt so quickly to being in a room full of living oddities, and then realized the answer: you just did. There wasn’t a secret, or a system, or a script. You just kept showing up until you fit in by default.

At some point, Autumn nudged Summer’s arm and nodded at Norah’s untouched plate. “You never even started,” she said, so softly that only Summer could have heard.

Norah looked down, surprised, then picked up her fork and started to eat. “Didn’t want to be the first one, ended up as the last one,” she said, and the line was so dry it could have been a joke, but wasn’t.

The four of them—twins, Norah, and Erin—fell into a quiet, even rhythm, tucked into the edge of the morning while the rest of the world spun around them.

---

By ten in the morning, the Dance Hall had filled past anything Sarah Hawkins recognized as a room for food or conversation. There were at least fifty women crammed into the space, most of them taking up round tables built for half that, others in the walkways, some perched on window sills, several standing, apparently content to eat out of their hands. Wings and tails and other, stranger things caught the light at every edge of her vision—animal patterns, unnatural colors, extra limbs and bared skin. Nobody seemed to notice or care, except Sarah. She couldn’t stop noticing.

She had claimed a table at the edge, half-turned away from the main crush of the crowd, shoulders rounded forward, arms close in against her ribs. The “resort casual” outfit she’d picked—a long sleeved top with a neckline deeper than she ever would have worn before, and a short skirt that clung tightly to the curves she was still getting used to—felt like the wrong uniform, but she clung to it. Matt wasn’t here. He’d joined the bachelor party, and all Sarah knew about that was what had been on the invite. Including the ‘Island Challenge,’ which Sarah was still hoping was a joke.

Poppy had abandoned her seat ten minutes ago, chasing a photo across the Hall. The girl was small, just over three feet tall in her shoes, but she moved with a focus Sarah found intimidating. Even now, Sarah could track her across the room: short black hair, the telltale harness of inexplicably shrunken camera gear, the way Poppy ignored the swirling tide of women as if she were made of different matter.

Sarah followed Poppy’s line of sight, and found her quarry: a woman by herself against the far wall, knees drawn to her chest, arms wrapped around her own legs. Her hair was the first thing that registered—thick, dark, and long enough to puddle in a small lake around her. The dress she wore was draped and belted, the kind of thing you’d expect to see on an ancient statue or in a display case at a museum. The woman’s eyes were huge, black, and staring straight back at Poppy. Neither one looked away. It was like watching an animal spot another animal through glass; Sarah felt for a second that she might be the one inside the exhibit.

She looked down, as if it were possible to make herself disappear by lowering her gaze. She wrapped her hands around her coffee, which was going lukewarm, and debated whether she could risk a sip without anyone noticing if her hand shook.

A shadow fell over the table, and Sarah braced for the possibility that the unsettling maid had returned to try and refill her coffee again, but instead it was a young woman crossing the room in deliberate, unhurried steps, blonde-pink hair falling loose past her waist and nothing on but a pair of plain sandals and the hair itself, which managed to almost cover her, barely. She was slim but big-breasted, pretty, and seemed completely unbothered by her own nudity. She walked directly to the table, pulled out the chair opposite Sarah, and sat down.

The woman extended her hand and said, “Hi. I’m Emily. I’m one of the brides. I saw you sitting here by yourself and thought you could use company.”

Sarah’s mouth opened, closed, then opened again. She could feel her own face flushing as she registered the full reality of Emily—unclothed, sun-kissed, smiling with the easy warmth of someone who has never in her life needed to justify a single thing about herself.

Sarah said, “I—I’m Sarah.” She was mortified by how it came out, and rushed to add, “Sarah Hawkins. Sorry. I mean—thank you, for coming over. I’m just—I wasn’t sure if it was okay to, you know, sit anywhere.”

For a second, neither of them spoke, and Sarah was certain she’d failed the simple task of being a normal person. Her eyes locked on the top of Emily’s head—roots and pink tips soft against the window light—and only after a full heartbeat did she realize Emily was still offering her hand, palm up, fingers waiting with the patience of someone who had grown very good at waiting.

Sarah fumbled her own hand into Emily’s, expecting a formality, but Emily just squeezed gently and let go. There was a subtle care to it, not the brusque efficiency of a handshake but the precise, non-awkward warmth of someone who’d practiced being safe for people. Emily’s smile deepened a fraction, and her attention drifted from Sarah’s face to the scarf, the coffee cup, the hands. There was no flicker of judgment. If anything, her gaze seemed to search for something that would make Sarah more comfortable.

Emily tucked her hair behind one ear and said, “I used to hate coming to these things alone. Back home I mean, not—” she waved at the surreal backdrop of the Hall, “not in places like this, just regular bars or parties. It’s so much better with someone you know.” She shrugged, bare shoulders glinting in the low morning light. “Or at least with someone you don’t mind talking to.”

Sarah’s mouth went dry, but she nodded, then shook her head, then nodded again. “I don’t mind at all. I mean, I’m grateful.” She took a breath, the kind you have to count through, then said, “My husband is at the other party. Bachelor party. I was supposed to have—” She glanced at the empty seat. “Company. But I guess she’s busy.” The words came out fine but the subtext was obvious, and Emily caught it with a sympathetic tilt of her head.

“Which one is yours?” Emily asked, voice gentle. “The husband, I mean.”

Sarah glanced down at the table. “Matt. Matthew Hawkins. I'm sure he's shaken everyone's hand and memorised three facts about each of them by now. He's a lot better at this than I am.” She realized she was babbling and cut herself off, blushing harder.

Emily’s eyes lit with fondness. “I get why you’d miss him.”

Sarah sipped her coffee, and this time her hand barely shook at all. She watched the way Emily settled into her chair, leg tucked up under herself, elbows loose and not at all performative. Her hair fell like a waterfall, and regardless of how she moved, it always covered her just enough. There was a grace to her nudity, the way her hair fell around her breasts, a perfect nonchalance that made Sarah feel simultaneously more and less awkward about the whole situation. Emily was impossible not to look at, but her expression was so open that Sarah relaxed a fraction, just enough to stop monitoring her own every breath.

“You don’t seem like you hate being here,” Sarah said, almost surprising herself.

Emily considered, then smiled. “It’s weird, but I’ve lived in weirder. A couple of years before I was taken to Harem Hotel, I spent a couple months with a guy who didn’t believe in chairs. We ate every meal on the floor. He used to joke that we’d evolved past the need for sitting, but it was definitely just that he didn’t want to buy furniture.” She said it with a dryness Sarah recognized as a survival strategy.

Sarah snorted. “My university flatmate convinced herself that plants could feel pain. She’d apologize to the parsley every time she cooked. It got so bad we had to switch to dried herbs, so she wouldn’t have to ‘listen to the screaming.’”

Emily made a soft, appreciative sound, and Sarah realized she’d gotten through a full three sentences without a single stammer or apology. It felt, in a way, like winning something. She risked another glance at the Hall.

“I can’t stop watching the room,” Sarah admitted. “There are women with fox tails, and cat ears, and wings, and six arms—there’s a woman by the wall who looks like she stepped out of a myth. Actually, there are several. I keep thinking if I just get used to it, I’ll stop noticing, but it’s not happening.”

Emily followed her gaze and said, “Oh, that’s Oudemia. Or at least, I think that’s the name. Sorry, most people here are not people I know either. But I overheard someone mention that she’s an immortal princess or something.” She didn’t sound like she was joking, which made it worse.

Sarah blinked. “She’s just… sitting there? She’s been staring at Poppy for a while.”

Emily nodded, easy. “Poppy’s the photographer, right? I’ve seen her taking candids here and there. I think they might be communicating by… not blinking?”

Sarah laughed, the kind that threatened to become a snort. She clapped a hand over her mouth, then, realizing that was even more awkward, dropped it again. “I love it,” she said, and felt the unfamiliar word in her mouth like a new taste. “I love that they’re both doing it, and it’s probably more real than anything I’ve ever said out loud.”

Emily’s smile turned gentle. “I think that’s how it works here. You just find the other weirdos, and try to make each other feel a little more like yourself.”

Sarah looked down, the words landing somewhere that felt unexpectedly soft. For a moment, she imagined herself not as a foreign object or a mistake, but as part of a pattern that might actually fit.

She was about to reply when she saw Poppy circling back, camera at her chest, a look of faint satisfaction on her face. She was headed straight for their table. At the last second, she caught Sarah’s eye, and Sarah—without thinking—raised a hand in greeting. Poppy nodded, then slid into her seat, eyes darting between Sarah and Emily with a sharp, birdlike intelligence.

Emily greeted her warmly. “Welcome back! We were just talking about you.”

Poppy blinked slowly. “I like that.” She set the camera on the table and turned it so the back screen faced Sarah. “You want to see?”

Sarah nodded. Poppy scrolled through a few images—Oudemia against the wall, hair like a tide, eyes black and endless; a candid of a teal-haired catgirl, mouth open in mid-laugh; a table crowded with hands, every shape and color, all reaching for the same bread basket. The images were beautiful, but more than that, they were real. They captured the room as it actually was, not as Sarah had feared it might be.

“These are incredible,” Sarah said, her voice catching on the word. “How did you learn to do this?”

Poppy shrugged. “It’s the only thing I ever wanted to do.”

Emily, watching the exchange, said, “It is a compliment. I think you’re the only person here who sees it all.”

Sarah found herself wanting to say something to Emily, to thank her, to tell her that she’d made the morning not just bearable but good. Instead, she just smiled, and it was a real one, wide and a little crooked.

Emily saw it, and matched the smile. “What?” she asked, grinning.

Sarah shook her head. “Nothing. Just—you’re right. This is better with company.”

Emily leaned forward, elbows on the table, conspiratorial. “Want to people-watch for a while and make up stories about everyone?”

Sarah laughed, louder than she meant to. “Desperately.”

For the first time since arriving, Sarah felt the tension leave her shoulders. She looked out at the room, and instead of seeing the things that didn’t belong, she saw the ways people were trying. Even if it was strange, even if they didn’t understand the rules, they were doing their best to be real for each other.

Maybe that was enough, in a place like this one. Sarah took a long drink of her coffee, and this time, it tasted significantly better.